


a life in your shape

by oikawafflehouse



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon Era, Early Mornings, Established Relationship, Implied Sexual Content, Multi, Polyamory, Relationship Study, akiteru is a giant sap, but so am i so we cancel each other out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-05
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-12 08:35:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29631951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oikawafflehouse/pseuds/oikawafflehouse
Summary: Something good grows here.
Relationships: Tanaka Saeko/Tsukishima Akiteru/Udai Tenma
Comments: 10
Kudos: 23
Collections: Haikyuu Writer Jukebox Round One - Mitski





	a life in your shape

**Author's Note:**

> [ look at you strawberry blond.](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3Kb9ndYQT4Znjh6H5WCgPj)
> 
> i. linked above is a playlist to listen to while reading if you would like.  
> ii. this was written for the hq writer mitski jukebox event. my assigned song was 'strawberry blond', and so it serves as the main inspiration for this story.  
> iii. happy reading! <3

_I'm saying I know all about you, whoever you are,  
_ _it's spring, and it's starting again,  
the longing that begins, and begins, and begins._

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


In the morning, Akiteru is the first to rise, as he has always been known to do.

Always, as in, the repeated ritual wears itself into his weathered, glass-blown bones, every notch for every year lived since the first time he broke his own heart. As in, it runs deeper than any blue river of doubt he might have drowned himself in when he was in high school and full of big, grand plans for the future, wearing a spoken, barbed wire lies like a golden cross necklace, tucked away and hidden from the world he would rather do without.

As in, it isn’t necessary for him to turn around and check to see if whether or not Tenma is sprawled out in the middle of their bed, doused in a perfect square of weak sunlight with drool running alongside his face, or if Saeko’s hand is resting gently on top of Tenma’s chest, her painted-blue fingernails shimmering like a lucid dream.

It isn’t necessary in the slightest - that kind of always, unyielding and sure, because that is what he is for the first time in his life; sure of himself, the _whole_ of himself - but he still does it anyway as he slips out from underneath their cocoon of morning sun-baked blankets, carefully, as not to wake them, for as the dark earth has always known the patient hands of spring and the ever-changing colors of the sky above, he knows them as ones to call his own. 

He knows them, how they move, how they fit, how they feel, how their voices reach out from the other side of a distant phone call, how their eyes look when it’s raining, how his name sounds coming from each of their mouths. (Tenma speaks of it as if it were a secret to be shouted from the rooftops for all the birds to hear; Saeko, like a whispered curse.) 

Still. Akiteru looks to them, reverent and knowingly. Finds the given shape of their familiarity to him along the jagged folds of grey skies and coffee cups made up of stains and spirals of cracks. Wraps himself up in the memory of April. Wishes for them kinder days, and, even more quietly, wishes it for himself.

There is to be no hiding here; the gentle hum of their breathing, even in sleep, tell him so. 

:: 

They are: the hazy afterglow of Christmas lights; warm, clinging, fluorescent, blinking out a promise on a cold winter night, _I am here, I am here, I am here_. 

They are: heartbeats against heartbeats, painting flowers alongside the insides of each other’s legs, balancing the stems of cherries on the crests of their red-stained lips, carving songs of love into the wooden bedposts, into the scratched-up floorboards, into the smalls of their backs. 

They are: a collection of shiny collarbones, patched-up elbows, dark eyes. All something far too much for anyone else but each other to bear. Far too sharp, far too hungry and distant. A bruise on the horizon.

They are, when together: a slow burn, in the best of ways. In the kindest of ways. 

:: 

  
  
  


Akiteru isn’t certain where they found their first promise of _always_ , as he strongly believes it to have always existed, out of reach and out of sight like many good things are. Maybe it was in the halls of their high school, when they were made up of crooked teeth and shirts with missing buttons and gangly limbs and everything else stacked in between, balanced along the edges of their love-stuck ribs that have grown tough over the course of years full of sadness and heartache. Before they all really knew each other, before they became more than just half-familiar, passing shadows.

Maybe it was found in the stands of a crowded volleyball gymnasium, shrouded in the harsh glare of the lights above as they watched those younger than them play out the same melodramas they themselves once lived through, built upon the foundations of their realization for their love of the sport, and then, slowly but surely, their love for each other. 

Maybe it comes from the edge of a field, where something good grows, towards the sweet breath of life instead of away from it. 

Akiteru isn’t certain, but he can still feel the warmth on his face nonetheless, when his hands start to tremble as they move to meet Tenma’s own pale ones, right before they move to go _down down down_ and further still until it isn't even to just hold but to devour, hungry as they both are, and when he finds his cheek pressed against Saeko’s own as they stand together, swaying, caught in the yellow refrigerator light. When all three of them, together, find stolen moments throughout the day to enjoy the sense of quiet each of them brings, something sacred, something that responds to the call of their hearts.

He isn’t certain, just knows enough to know that it is something that can be both taken and given and that there aren’t enough trips around the sun for him to give all that he has with every ounce of his being, blown-in like the remnants of a fleeting daydream, hopeful and lingering. 

Akiteru can try, though. He can try, and continue to meet it head-on, as stubborn as he pretends to not be. He knows this just as well, too. There is no more room for hiding. Just enough to hold the other two close, and, more importantly, to be seen. 

:: 

Adulthood sinks in gently, not with the snarl of teeth bared against a grey sky and the gods that reside there, but with the soft call of a lark song. They all wear it well, Akiteru thinks.

::

When they fell in together, it was more like everything coming together, the frayed strands of themselves becoming whole once more as Saeko likes to say. _Because we're continuously falling apart, you know?_ she'd joke with her champagne laughter, as if it were the best kind of secret. She's always been sure of herself, and her actions and words. Tenma, too, though it's hard to tell when you look at him through the filtered lens of a once-burning legacy, and when he looks back right at you like you're a city on fire.

Akiteru doesn't think they're looking for a legacy, or places to burn. Just a place to land, when everything becomes too much.

::

“I am going to quit my job and move to Greenland,” Tenma announces on a different morning, before they decided to keep all their scars and burnt tongues under the same roof. He sits at the kitchen counter, hunched up over his computer with his hair tied up, held together haphazardly by a single pen. “And neither of you can stop me. So there.” 

“Yes, we can,” Akiteru says, barely looking up from his phone, just as Saeko lets out a giggle that sounds like the crinkle like a candy wrapper before saying, “You wish.”

Tenma frowns at both of them, though it’s somewhat difficult to take him seriously, seeing as if he makes these kinds of declarations every other Tuesday, the location growing further and further away depending on his given workload at the time. “You don’t understand. It’s for my own safety. Akaashi is going to murder me.” He pauses, his eyes widening before continuing on in a dramatic whisper, which really isn’t all that different from how he normally talks, unfortunately. “ _Do you guys want Akaashi to murder me?_ ”

“Nope.” 

“Yes.” 

“Akiteru. Akiteru, I swear to god- _”_

“Greenland’s too cold,” Akiteru says, cutting him off in whatever flimsy promise he was about to make; Tenma does this a lot, too. “You wouldn’t last a day, you big baby.” He puts down his phone and glances up at the ceiling, once again catching sight of the suspicious, brown stain that’s been bothering him all morning. Absent-mindedly, he wonders if he should tell Tenma about it, since it’s his apartment that they’re crashing, after all. He figures he’s already in a bad mood enough already. 

“Where else am I supposed to go then.” It’s not a question. The words sound syrupy and full of something thick, almost as if they were stuck in the back of Tenma’s throat. Akiteru wants to drag them out of there. He wants to swallow them whole. 

“I don’t know,” Akiteru says slowly as he meets Tenma’s beetle-dark eyes, fully aware of Saeko’s own stare following him from over the rim of the green mug she holds and the heavy change in atmosphere. “I don’t know, but I’d go anywhere else with you. Both of you. And I think you'd do the same.” 

Tenma stares at him, unabashed, with his round, flashlight eyes, a ghost hovering inside of each of them. Akiteru looks down, wondering if he’d misjudged everything, and if this morning, this morning after, wasn’t built for such words. They all have white flags staked upon their own hearts, ever since that first day when he and Saeko collided, and then again when Tenma bridged the distance in one single leap; this is his. This is his, and it cuts like a knife against a stark sky with longing. 

He inhales, and waits.

Saeko, miraculous as ever, lets out something that sounds like a sigh of relief. “Of course,” she says, her voice gravelly and well-known to Akiteru’s ears. She reaches out, placing her mug down before placing one hand on top of Akiteru’s shoulder, the other meeting Tenma’s own. “Of course we would.” 

Akiteru exhales as they all move to gather one another up, trying to get as close as they possibly can, because they are desperate to be more than skin and bone. Heartbeats against heartbeats, just as the earth stretches onwards to meet the sky above. 

The white flag waves on. The palms of spring continue to sift through the dark, fertile soil, steadfast and true.

:: 

Again and again, the movies show them how love should be. Again and again, they fight for something to call their own, knowing that it won't ever be Greenland, with its unforgiving ice and snow, or the seemingly-perfect love they’ve been raised up on; all shadow puppets and paper dolls and winter silence.

It erupts like the spring; the humming of bees, the bursting of fruit, the collision of flowers. Not once will they ever be apologetic for this. 

:: 

Their home, the home they eventually build together, is: sliced fruit pressed in the palms of their hands, three pairs of keys placed inside in a white envelope, a road leading towards Sendai, paved with hope. 

Their home, given and taken, is: 3 AM-longing stares, swollen lips, fingertips smudged with the ink of a pen, stars in their eyes and oceans between the sheets, heads bowed and hands searching, always searching.

Their home, built for three hearts, is: everything they could ever ask for, and more. And more. 

::

Akiteru may be the first to rise, but Tenma and Saeko are never too far behind. 

Their chatter slowly fills up the kitchen, ballooning in size until Akiteru has no choice but to join in, laughing at Tenma’s bedhead, helping Saeko unwrap the leftover banana bread from yesterday’s breakfast, squeezing in a small kiss on the forehead for each of them. 

“You’re in a good mood today,” Saeko points out as she leans up against the counter, a small grin stretching across her features. She looks happy, too. 

Akiteru smiles back at her, noticing that she’s wearing one of his old shirts and a pair of Tenma’s house shoes. It fits. Everything fits. “I am, actually.” 

“Any particular reason?” Tenma asks him around a mouth stuffed with banana bread. Akiteru silently tells himself he is in a good mood, and that it doesn't bother him. Not in the slightest. 

“No. Not really.”

“Just because?” 

“Just because.” 

“Ehh?” 

Akiteru rests his back against the cool, metal of the refrigerator door, watching as Saeko pours herself another cup of coffee, leaning over to twirl through her fingers the strands of Tenma’s hair and asking him if he'd like to borrow a hair tie as he helps himself to his third helping of banana bread. Something in his chest stirs, grows wings, and flies away through the open kitchen window where late winter waits to give way to spring. He melts into their light, into the space they’ve created, undisturbed by the rest of the world they’ve done away with. Almost barely, Akiteru notices it is raining. Their eyes are light.

Akiteru does not say, _it’s because of you guys, it’s because of the perfect we’ve built here, of how happy the two of you sound, how happy you make me. I don't think I ever used to be this happy._

Akiteru does not say anything. They already know.

It’s not necessary. Spring lives in a temple built by a gentle nudge and palms lined with folklore with happy endings. The earth knows this and waits, just as the sky bleeds with all the colors of love, until they can count each and every shade as well as they can count each other's scars and dreams. 

And this is the given form of a promise, of a trip to somewhere else that is decidedly not Greenland. This is the given form of a sanctuary, a here-on-after, an always shared between three people, each wearing their hearts out on their sleeves, never hidden, never cast away. This is love, spreading throughout their names and throughout their touch. This is where something good grows. 

**Author's Note:**

> come yell at me on [twitter.](https://twitter.com/oikawafflehouse)
> 
> there's something about characters eating breakfast together that just makes me want to eat my laptop. that's all. 
> 
> thank you for reading! kudos and comments are always appreciated <3


End file.
